Cursed
by NeonNinja
Summary: AU HUMAN! If you were to ask someone what the worst way to die would be, they may say drowning or burning. If you ask me, what's worse than dying like that? Not dying. This is the story of how I died, or more like the story of how I didn't die, when really I should have. I wish I had. But now, I am neither alive nor dead. I am cursed.


**-Author's note: If you don't like stories where the turtles are human don't read or complain. **

**I do not own any of the characters in this story - apart from the ones I have made up (these will be introduced later.) -**

**Raphael's P.O.V**

It's been hard without my big brother. It's been hard seeing the sorrowful looks on my remaining brothers' faces. They're lost. I'm lost, though I don't wanna say it. It's been seven months, the seven most joyless and difficult months I have ever endured. Suddenly I'm the oldest brother, I'm the one Donny and Mikey look towards for comfort, something, no matter how hard I try, I can't provide. This expectation, this responsibility, it's almost too much. How did Leo ever cope? I used to give him such a hard time, always complaining and yelling and … and now it's too late. I say sorry to him into the night air as much as I like, it's not gonna change anything.

The worst part? We don't even know where he is. All we found was a pool of blood – too much blood a person could lose and still live - and his stained katanas laying some feet away. We searched all night, all the next day. Days and nights passed and our efforts counted for nothing, we were no nearer to finding out what happened to our big brother. That was the hardest part of it all - the not knowing.

I roll off the couch, knocking the television remote onto the floor, and move towards the kitchen. I open the fridge and pour some of the milk into a still-dirty glass. A sour smell meets me. The milk is gone-off. With a grumble I drop the glass into the sink, harder than I had intended and it cracked. The milk disappears down the drain.

"Raph?" comes a voice that immediately causes my posture to slump, "are you alright?"

"Sure, Mikey. I'm fine." I say, putting on my best _'I'm okay, there's nothing wrong' _expression. But simply looking at my youngest brother's face, worn and pale from seven months of grief and sleepless nights – I often hear him in the middle of the night tossing and turning and calling Leo's name – makes my heart ache. He has taken Leo's death the worst.

"Okay." He says quietly, shrugging on his coat. I stare at him.

"Where are you going?" I ask, although already pretty sure I know the answer.

"Out."

"To the warehouse again? Mikey, please stop doing this to yourself."

"I can't. I just … he's out there Raph."

"Mikey." I can feel myself getting impatient, we have had this conversation with him many times before – he still, despite everything, despite all this time, believes Leo is alive. "There is no point, you have …"

"I refuse to believe my big brother, _our_ brother is dead until I see proof! Until then I …"

"Wasn't the blood and seven months of nothing not proof enough!?" I snap, hating myself immediately, It's not his fault. I wish I hold onto those threads of hope as easily.

"Not for me!" Mikey growls furiously. He glares at me. "Maybe for you, but not for me!" He pulls his hood up over his head, strands of his dirty blonde hair sticking out from beneath it, then storms out, door slamming behind him. Our family photos hanging on the wall shudder. I lean back against the kitchen counter and pinch the bridge of my nose.

"He's going to the warehouse again isn't he?" Donny stands opposite me, a broken gadget in one hand and a screwdriver in the other. Behind him our father watches us, eyes full of loss.

**Mikey's P.O.V**

How can they just give up? Just accept it? I wipe my tears – both of frustration and sorrow – onto the sleeve of my jacket. I can't give up, despite it all something deep inside is screaming at me to keep believing that, against what my brothers have given in to think, Leo is out there. I've been pedalling my bicycle so furiously that my legs are beginning to burn. But now the old warehouse, abandoned on the outskirts of the city, is coming into view. My stomach feels like lead at the sight of the aged building with its smashed windows and crumbling bricks. Even so I pull up to it, the wheels kicking up dirt as I pull the breaks. I jump off the bike and leave it at the top of an embankment.

The warehouse is how it is every other time I've been here. Deathly quiet and lonely, it has a terrifying feeling, the air is icy all the time and it smells musky and dead. I click my flashlight on and point it around me at the familiar cracked walls, some have peeling paint on them and others aren't even there anymore, just a crumbly brick skeleton of what was. I climb up an old stairwell, remembering which steps were unsteady and at risk of breaking away into nothing. Light from a window pick out the specks of dust in the air around me. My free hand goes to my belt where I have tucked my nun-chucks, the feel of them there reassures me. I tap my fingers on them as I get an uneasy feeling, something I get all the time and am not accustomed to. It's the memories of this place and of that night. I leave the stairwell on the second floor and walk carefully, trying to avoid the debris littering the floor, along a bitter hallway until I reach a doorway and push at the door which opens with a loud and echoing metallic groan. I step inside and shine my torch around. Then I freeze, breath catching in my throat. The light stops on a dark stain on the concrete floor. That was all that was all we found of our brother. That was where the blood had been. I walk up to it, eyes blurring with tears. All the memories came flooding back. The sounds of Leo's katanas slashing at something. The sound of Leo calling out and screaming in pain and terror. Then how everything suddenly fell deadly silent and there was nothing.

"Leo." I say quietly, "I'm sorry we couldn't help you bro. But, I don't know why, I can't give up in believing you're still alive somewhere. You never gave up on me, no matter how hopeless I was sometimes, and now I'm not gonna give up on you. Not until I know for sure."

Time passed and the moon was lowering in the sky until it was replaced by the dim glow of an oncoming sunrise. And now I am stood looking out of a window – one of the only ones to still have glass remaining – watching as some of the light of the city turn on as early risers wake for another days work. Suddenly behind me in my reflection there's a figure staring at me. Even in the still darkness of the building and the dusty glass I see his pale face and dark eyes. His black hair is matted and he looks unwell. Even so I recognise his face immediately, I've stared at pictures of it for seven months, seen it every time I close my eyes.

"Leo!" I cry spinning around. From the corner of my eye I see him dart out of the room. I click my flashlight back on and take off in pursuit. I call his name again. I run faster than I ever have before, but still I can't seem to catch him up. Then I hit a dead end and I feel ice in my veins and fear washes over me. I stare at the words on the wall, written in red. Blood red.

**GET OUT OF HERE. **

**YOU MUST RUN.**

**RUN.**

**NOW. **


End file.
